The Press Box - The Bulwark's Tim Miller on What Can Stop Trump, JD Vance's Superpower, the Epstein Files Fallout, and More

Episode Date: February 10, 2026

Hello, media consumers! Bryan is joined by The Bulwark’s Tim Miller to discuss myriad topics across the political landscape. They discuss how Donald Trump’s second term has gone compared to Tim's expectations (12:35), whether there are any candidates for President that have been impressive (34:28), and why Jeff Bezos still owns the Washington Post (53:37). Later on, they talk about what Tim misses about working in politics (1:05:02), which candidate he's worked with that would’ve been the best President (1:08:14), and much more. Host: Bryan CurtisGuest: Tim MillerProducers: Isaiah Blakely, Bruce Baldwin, and Jamie Yukich Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello media consumers. Welcome to Pressbox. It's Brian Curtis, along with producers Isaiah Blakely and Bruce Baldwin. We are joined today by the man sitting across from me at Ringer headquarters. He is the only celebrity Denver Nuggets fan. I think that's true. And the Nuggets made it to the NBA finals famously two years ago, became the champions. I heard about that.

And the year before, Bill had had on, oh, who's the famous celebrity Bucks fan that he likes to have on, writes the news? letter. Anyway, had that guy on and I was like, this could be me next year when the nuggets are in. This could be me. But I didn't get the phone call. And so, you know, I'm hoping. I'm in my P.E. Watch shirt. He's having a breakout year. Yokic is Yokic. You know, it could happen again. There could be another chance. I'm hoping. Yokish needs one more. I just want one more. You're ringing so hard right now. I didn't even get through the intro. Yeah. This is Tim Miller, by the way. The Bullwark podcast is here. Did we not? Did you not say my name?

I didn't know. I started doing Peyton Watson. People know me at this point. People know you. I guess. I don't know. Maybe not. Maybe not in a Nuggets context, but they know you quite well. We're about to find out. Do you remember the last time we potted together? I remember that we have potted together. I can't recall the topic. Right after Joe Biden debated Donald Trump. Oh, my God. Yes.

Yeah. That was a traumatic period. No wonder I don't remember that. I blacked it out. The only time I ever missed a TV hit my entire life on MS Now. formerly as NBC was that next morning. I was supposed to be on Morning Joe. But I was chain smoking cigarettes and rage typing a bulwark article about how Joe Biden need to drop out and maybe drinking a little bit until like 4.30 in the morning. And I passed out.

And not only did I miss my alarm, I like rolled way. It was 10. It was like 9. People were about to send people to the hotel room to make sure I was still alive. It was that level of, I didn't just sleep through morning, Joe. I slept through whatever's on after morning Joe. I slept through the whole deal. So it was a traumatizing experience to be there for that.

And think about that. A traumatic moment in American politics. And that seems, you know, now it's somewhere on the list of things that happened. I don't know. It's still pretty high up there in the rankings for me. I mean, it's largely responsible for while we're here. I've got a lot of Joe Biden bitterness that I could share. It's probably not right for the press box podcast.

Well, I don't know. You might get there. So, yeah. I think it's still, it's pretty significant. I mean, the shit that has happened since has been obviously more harmful to those things. But we could blame a lot of it.

A lot of it goes back to that. I mean, you know, look, a disaster like this has a lot of fathers, you know, and we could go back to Iraq. We could go back to the invention of the cell phones. Like the apprentice putting him on TV. I mean, like, there are a lot of different things that had to happen,

things that had to go wrong to get us here. But Joe Biden running again and then participating in that debate, was one of the factors for sure. And indeed is somewhere on the list. Most important question I'm going to ask you. Bad Bunny or Kid Rock last night? Boy, hmm, that's a tough one, you know, as an elder millennial,

Kid Rock was pretty influential when I was in high school. But I got to go with Bad Bunny. I liked that Nueva Yol that he ended with. The set design was unbelievable. Oh, my God. Unbelievable. So trees, everything. Wasn't my favorite Gaga song.

But it was a good set. You know, this whole thing, there's this guy, it's like a New Orleans, I was a New Orleans podcast guy called Hold de Mayo when he was posting today. He doesn't do politics at all. He's just a sports guy. And he was just like, you know,

I didn't know a lot about Bad Bunny, and I kind of liked it. It's pretty cool. And his audience is like freaking out. Like the comment section is all either like, fuck you, you know what I mean? Like, I don't know, do we have to, this is, I guess, a typical centrist squish bulwold

view, but like, do we have to polarize around the halftime show? And it could be pretty good. I thought it was pretty good. And it had some very significant, you know, themes. I thought it was moving at the end, how he talked about the Americas broadly and how we're won. And maybe he gets through to some people.

And Trump did get some gains in the Latino community? So, you know, whatever. But I don't know. Did we do this before? Like, was it like this, you know, in the aughts? It wasn't. It wasn't polarized. And I also don't think we all had an opinion about the Super Bowl half.

Some people did. Some people didn't. Yeah. You know, it also takes it back to the phones. You shared it with your friends at the party, you know. I actually remember in high school. I can't remember what was it? Was it McCartney? I remember being in high school with my buddies at, you know, at Super Bowl party.

And, you know, some people liked it. Some people didn't. We moved on. My favorite last night would lay, the allies, if you will, the pro bad bunny crowd. They were watching and they were like, I wish I spoke Spanish. I'm like, you know, we had, we had middle school. schools and high schools that would have helped you accomplish that goal had you wanted to speak Spanish.

Yeah. Here you are an adult. You don't speak Spanish. You don't understand all the lyrics. I'm sorry. And I got to say, and I hope that this doesn't offend any of like the bunny heads out there. Like the music is better than lyrics. Actually, I did do a lyrics deep dive because I was playing a, uh, played a little game on the board podcast with David French and asked him if he could tell the difference between a bad money and a kid rock lyric.

And the bad money lyrics are more sophisticated than the kid rock lyrics for sure. But it's, you know, it's not Dylan. Okay. I mean, it's not. Sure. It's not Kendrick. I mean, it's good. It's part of music, you know.

And so, I don't know. I think that people could be, could survive and be happy to just enjoy the music without having to know the lyrics. That's, that's an, that's an okay experience. Totally. I watched a little the Turning Point USA halftime show this morning. Why? Well, you know, podcasting. This is what we do.

Content. I'll just share one highlight with you. starts. Was Kelsey Grammer really there or was that a joke? I did not get to that. I didn't say, I watched the whole thing. I was watching a thread of things that happened.

And I think it was a troll. Like in the middle of them, they dumped in like Kelsey Grammer sang a rendition of tossed salad and scrambled eggs. That was actually pretty good. I'm pretty sure that did not happen. All right. So which part did you see? They did start with a national anthem.

I don't know about where you come from, but in real America, where I come from. We play the national anthem at the beginning of the football game. Yeah. And we don't come back around to the, at halftime, yeah. No one's ever said, hey, the National Anthem, can we do that again? Yeah.

No. Was it a good rendition? Was it better than Charlie? You know, kind of a little Hendricksie. Yeah. That's fine. All right. Kelsey Gramer's thinking is incredible.

I don't know. I think it's pretty sad. I think it's pretty sad that, I mean, folks don't know about me. Like, I used to be a Republican. And I just, like, the grievance and the bitterness and the news. needing to complain about everything. It's really just not healthy. You know, I don't, I don't understand what it attracts anybody to this.

Like, they feel like they have to be so aggrieved for the halftime performance. They've got to create their own. They've got to go pretend to like kid rock. Who is this? Like, why? Why do this to yourself? You know, life is too short for these kind of quibbles. I agree.

I totally agree. Yeah. Here's a question for you. Yeah. How is Donald Trump changed pop culture, do you think? Well, I mean, a lot of ways, it's career-wise, unfortunately. I mean, you know, I fucking hate Donald Trump, right, you know, as much as anybody. All right.

I give no quarter to anyone in that competition. But, like, you just have to acknowledge his success in this front. I mean, the fact that he was so ubiquitous, you know, before he ran for president, right? Like, he's in home alone. He's in. How many rap lyrics is he in? Like, he's in a lot of rap lyrics before FDT. Like, you know, when it was like, we're trying to be like Donald Trump, like that kind of, you know, rich guy, unapologetic, you know, brash brand, I think was definitely influential in, you know, his heyday before.

Obviously, the apprentice had cultural cachet. And then I think now, like, the way that people, that elites like have to talk. now. This is, I mean, this is, this is maybe a chicken or egg thing with Donald Trump and the phones, back to the phones, but like, Donald Trump's just let it rip. I'm going to weigh in on everything. I am going to be crude. People have now come to expect that. And I just, I was talking to a class of, uh, at college at Tulane. Um, and, you know, I asked him about, I made a reference to the 2012 campaign? One of my formative campaigns.

They don't remember anything from the 2012 campaign. This is like a political science. So Trump was in the 2016 campaign. So these guys, they don't know anything besides him. And so it's, it begins

sounds weird now, I think. If you are a CEO, athlete, a politician for sure. And you talk in like press, release talk now. Like, you kind of sound like the weird one. And so I feel

like he has had a degrading cultural effect on the way people talk even and the way people communicate. So that's not great. We could probably go out with some more things. Yeah, no, I totally agree about weighing it on everything. Because if you looked at him raging on true social last night about Bad Bunny, he eventually gets the NFL kickoff rule. He has an opinion about that too.

He doesn't like that. He doesn't like that. Yeah. No good. I kind of agree with him on that. I don't love it. Yeah. You kind of have to hand it to him on the end of the fucking. I don't have to hand it to him. He's bound to get one right at some point, you know.

Another thing, I was just thinking about this too, like the end of the conflict of interest. You know, Donald Trump has Trump meme coin-sized conflicts of interest. And I just feel that sort of filtered down to into culture. Like you just don't have to pick anymore. Yeah. Like in my world, you know, Tom Brady can be a part owner of the Raiders and call games on TV. And it's just he just shrug your way through it and go, eh. It's okay.

I do think, yeah, vice signaling. It's like eternally use that. Like it's sort of this reaction to virtue signaling where it's like almost good to signal that you like are rule breaker. Don't care about people's feelings or, you know, or doing an insult comic dog routine. Like that's good. Right.

Like, or to say something that you know will hurt somebody's feelings as like seen as a value. And I agree with you on the corruption part. It's, look, if the president is unapologetically corrupt and they have totally hollowed out the part of the Department of Justice that looks into public corruption

and white collar crime, what is the case for you to not be corrupt and cheap? I mean, you know, that's just like, I mean, Jan is joining Kalshi, for example, as a board member, I noticed that. Recently, it's like, this feels bad. I mean, you know, people are just betting on whether or not you were going to get traded two minutes ago. And now you're a board member of the financial stake.

So look, and again, not to do the whole like, won't somebody think of the children thing, but like kids. Like it filters down throughout the culture. You know, there's kind of a get mine like attitude where, you know, being a winner, winning culture, like being a winner, getting yours, you know, not feeling like you have to follow the rules or care about. consistency or virtue. Like that, I do think has trickled down throughout our society. Maybe there'll be a backlash against it. You know, there usually is backlash against things like this. I mean, I think the Trump is in a lot of ways is backlash against some of the accesses of, like,

the dominant woke culture, whatever you want to call it. But, boy, I don't know. It's kind of a long way back, I guess. How close is Trump's second administration to what you thought it would be? Hmm. Um, you know, in some ways worse, some ways better. Like, my biggest fear, like, if you'd called me, what are we? February, if you'd call me last Super Bowl, you know, he'd just gotten in, right,

for a week one or two. And so, like, what are your biggest fears? That's probably about that time he'd nominated cash a little bit before. And I was like, man, I'd look at that, I look at that FBI. We're talking about Matt Gates for DOJ for a while. And then it's Bondi. And I was like, at the top of my fear list is, the retribution campaign.

It's like the FBI has a ton of power and resources. I'm like knocking on wood right now that they can use before you get to a grand jury to like looking at people's phones, you know, come to your house, you know, shake people. Like, you know, the bad old days FBI

did a lot of stuff that we had, you know, rooted out over decades through reforms and norms and, you know, having people that had their, you know, best interests of the country at heart. And I was just like, man, I think that these guys are going to be ruthless and coming after their enemies list. And they have been like the Keystone cops on that front. And just a total, they're just stepping on rakes everywhere. Cash seems to care more about like going to his girlfriend's country music concerts than actually doing anything.

Pam Bondi. They can't find any lawyers to work for them. They have like parking garage lawyers going, you know, trying to go after Jim Comey. they haven't success like Don Lemon did have to spend the night in jail well not great bad you know but like I don't think anybody I don't think he's shaking in his boots that they're going to be able to take him down so that part has been less competent they've been way more I think competent than I would have expected in like the area of tearing down the government like what doge did and getting rid of USAID entirely was not something that was I had seen and then I think that they'd been about what I would have expected on immigration, which is horrible, which is the worst part of the term so far.

And then you would have expected some crazy Trump stuff. Like would I have pictured Greenland and Venezuela invasions? Like probably not. Those probably wouldn't have been my picks. But like the idea that he would do something goofy like that. Something like that. Yeah, it was about what you would expect. So, you know, I think that it's been bad.

And I guess I should have framed all that up by saying I was expecting extremely bad. So if it's kind of in the ballpark of what I expected, that's not great. Trump isn't popular right now. Do you think he cares that he's unpopular? And his dad didn't hug him. And so that does matter to him. Okay. At some level.

Like, he has a little bit of a black hole in his heart and he wants to be loved. You know, and he does. Wants to be adored and respected. And so I do think this like very minor pullback we've seen and some of the ICE and CVP activities over the past few weeks as a result of like, unlike Stephen Miller and maybe J.D. Vance and other autocrats throughout the world, I think that Trump is much more susceptible than other autocrats to like a couple of people calling him and being like, dude, like, you don't want white people dead in the streets. Like, that's not good. It's bad. You should stop. And I do think that,

like, you can get to him that way. And so that is a way in which he's different than, you know, some of the worst case scenario autocrats you hear thrown about for where we're headed. So, you know, from that standpoint, I think that he cares a little bit. He cares about the markets, right? And I don't, he doesn't, he's not acting like somebody who just is planning to stay no matter what. And he doesn't care if his approval rating is 18% and there's going to be blood in the streets. I mean, there'll be some people in my world in the anti-Trump world who will say that that's what he's acting like. That's not how I assess them.

And I assess it very bad, but I don't assess it like that. So I think it matters. And I think that his numbers get worse And they lose both chambers of Congress, which is possible, which I did not really, I thought the Senate was probably going to be out of play. And I'm starting to change my mind on that just because of the unpopularity of his, you know, his agenda so far.

So that would matter as far as like, how much time are they going to have to spend doing oversight? Now, are they going to care? Are they going to testify? Are they going to stonewall? Like, how do they act when he's a. total lane dunk in 2027, you'd be a fool to try to predict, right? Because who knows? And I remember on election night, I saw Chris Hayes and we were talking about this and I think

he made the point or I did, but we were both having agreement that like this term was the widest possible spectrum of outcomes of any possible term. You know, like he could have just decided to play golf all the time and been so happy he wasn't in jail and done nothing. Like, or he could, you know, try to be Putin, right, like, or anything in between. And, and I still feel that way, kind of about the last two years. Like, as he's aging, he's a lame duck, he's going to have a hostile Congress almost certainly. What does he, how does he react to that, right? Potentially not, not great. And so, you know, I think in the short term, he's more, he cares more about his public image than he might like in the last year. Yeah, and maybe there's a more precise way of

saying, does he care about a number in the Gallup poll? Or does he care, as you say, about somebody calling him on his cell phone? Yeah. And saying, like, hey, you don't want to do this. I think that's right. He cares about the markets. He cares about, you know, his rich buddies calling him. He cares about, you know, wanting to be able to get what he wants.

Like, to the degree that his numbers start to go down so much that other Republicans start blocking him from doing what he wants. And he might change his tune. But I agree with you. I don't know that he cares if he's at 39, verse 42. Tim Scott getting on Twitter after he posted the gross thing about the Obama's and being like, this is no good, please take it down. Yeah, he took it down.

He took it down. He didn't apologize. You know, there's no, you know, he doesn't deserve a medal for taking it down. He didn't say I'm going to be doing a lot of listening. Yeah. Going forward. But, you know, it shows that like he's responsive to that in a way that I don't know. I think that some people on the left don't appreciate.

I was thinking about moments he's kind of flinched or pulled back. You mentioned ICE after Alex Pretty to an extent. He got rid of the Sean Penn guy and, you know, demoted Christine Hohm. If only the Sean Penn guy had the Sean Penn end, you know. Oh, my God. Find a nice corner office for him. So I saw that movie a little bit late and then, you know, Minnesota happened that I was like, oh, I didn't know who was playing whom. Actually, who was based on the other guy in that scenario?

That was very weird. But Minnesota, Greenland maybe, depending on what his ambitions for Greenland actually were at the beginning of that whole adventure. and then the Obama's post. Those are moments he sort of climbed down. Terrace sometimes. Terrace in certain cases. Firing Powell. He waited that out.

I think he wanted to fire Powell at the Fed. One I like to bring up because I think it's pretty important, is that they wanted to use the El Salvador gulag as like a holding place for a whole lot of criminals. and like they put sent that first group of it's been a while now so i'm trying to remember 400 or so i think they said that first group of 400 or so there but but bukele comes to the white house after they're there and trump and them are joking on like a hot mic trump's like you're going to have to expand that place threefold because we're sending so many more people there huge backlash um to the fact that

they sent these venezuelans to el salvador with no due process nothing and they're in this you know essentially gulag. And eventually, because of like central American politics, South American politics is not really to do with us. The Venezuelans get sent from El Salvador to Venezuela. And now there's nobody there. I mean, they're El Salvadoran's there. But I think that's like telling me, right? I mean, they, they were, that was going to be, you know, they're, they're holding place for the undesirables. And they've backed off that so far. What do you think the biggest restraints on Trump's power will be? the next three years.

I'm sorry to be cheesy, but like, kind of us, I mean, regular people, not you and me. You know, podcasting doesn't hurt. The podcast class. Podcast bros, white podcast bros are actually going to be the thing that stands in the brink. Now, I just think, look, in Minneapolis, if people weren't on the streets, people let that happen, they'd still be there. I mean, they are still there, but like, they, the backdown was because people basically spoke out. And then sadly, there have been two deaths as a result of that. So it was not without real sacrifice.

In a, like, a less serious sense, Jimmy Kimmel, your buddy, cousin Jimmy got back on the air. Why? Because people said, no, fuck you. Like, had nobody talked about that? I don't know. I thought Iger might have been happy to leave Jimmy hanging out to dry. Steve Bannon was talking last week about how he wants to put ice agents outside of the voting locations. I kind of think that will backfire.

I think they should try that if they want, but I think that there will be more people who are not always midterm voters. Maybe they're just, maybe they're ringer sports consumers, not ringer press box consumers. you know, they're all watching you know, they're watching one of the other shows. And like, they're like, you know,

maybe I should vote this time in the midterms because F these guys. They're going to put troops outside the ballot box, no. So I just think that that is the best

constraint on him. There's not going to be a lot of constraints from inside. Conceivably the Supreme Court, I think we'll, I think we're going to learn a lot in the next session because they've got,

they've got some pretty easy calls on birthright citizenship, tariffs, are they going to are they going to let them do what he wants on those? That would be a pretty bad sign. So I think I think that most on the left have already checked off the

Supreme Court as a check. I, you know, I'm a little bit torn on that because they, because Trump has done the most illegal things of any president, so it's not surprising, but the Supreme Court has overturned Trump more than any this Supreme Court has overturned Trump more than any court has overturned any president since FDR.

And so I think it remains to be seen. Their political animals, too. Do they start, does Amy Coney Barrett and them start to see the exit? I don't know. You know, so, but unfortunately, I think it's, geez, Kamala Harris's term, I think it's got to be people power.

I think we're stuck with us. It sounds so corny when you say it. It is corny. It's corny, but I don't, but there's, there's not a lot of other good leverage points left. Who else is coming to save us? No, I don't, I don't have a list for you. They're not coming, like Batman or Super.

were hero of your choice. Another topic, sort of. What did you make of the latest batch of the Epstein files? I'm starting to, I think, grow into my inevitable final form, which is conspiratorial anti-government podcast, bro. Because I, I don't know. My take of that this is supposed to be political. because that's, you know, my beat, the politics.

But I just read through these emails, and I hate everybody in there, like, so much. And the idea that, like, some of the most powerful, richest, influential people in the world could not turn down a dinner invite to hang out with Woody Allen and Larry Summers. Boggles my mind. It's just, like, I just want there to be a few people in these emails

to be, like, replying, like, sorry, Jeffrey, you're a kid fucker. I'm not interested in dinner with Roman, Polanski. Thanks for the invite. Lose my number. Like, I want one of those emails and nobody does it. And this goes back to the, this, maybe shows that maybe Trump didn't have this influence on our culture. Maybe we have a cultural

rot. But like, this is all happening before him. But I just, the fact that in that period, after he gets out between 20, whenever that is, 2012, 2013, and 2017, 18, and he just like slowly moves back into society and everybody

just goes along with it. And he just leverages other people's influence and, you know, whitewashes himself the way the Saudis are whitewishing himself with golfers. And it's sickening. That part, that part is sickening. I think that, like, there is still a big question mark, which is which of these people were complicit in the child rapes? Because it isn't just Jeffrey Epstein and the Prince formerly, the Andrew formerly known as Prince Andrew. Like, there's other people. Like, just, just math dictates.

And so until that part is cleared up, I don't feel like anyone's going to be very satisfied. But that to me is the thing that it's like, okay, well, we still got 3 million docs, but it's like, who else was, who else was doing the kitty fucking? You know, we don't know.

And these files are just a massive grab bag of things, emails, and sometimes it's hard to see. Yeah, and it's also right. And it's also just, like the lack of trust. in our media institution. It's like, we're trying to do the best, I've tried to do the best we can to be responsible as a podcast

to us and all this because you see stuff online and like I'll have 11 million views. Like I thought, like here's one example. I saw. Somebody was sharing all the times that a person redacted wanted to have pizza and grape juice with or grape soda, pizza and great soda with Epstein. And so a lot of people online were like doing

Psy, Pee's gate was real. Oh, no. Like why could, why would this guy be wanting to have pizza and grape soda with Jeffrey Epstein? But then if you actually go and look at the files. I forget who I'm cribbing this from. So the shout-out to somebody who actually went through, and went through and looked at each reference. And in like what, at least one of the emails, the guy literally sends a picture of eating pizza and grape sauce. Maybe they just, they're just

old guys that like to go out for a slice and a grape soda. So you just don't know, right? Like, I do think that there are some people who used horrible judgment hanging out with him, but weren't involved in the child sex trafficking. And, and, and there are other people out there that that know that their bread is buttered right now and trying to make, you know, whatever cream cheese turn into a code word. And that stuff's hard to kind of separate out the wheat from the chaff, you know? Everybody was pointing to that John Ossoff clip when he was on the stump the other day.

How do you think the files will play politically, 26? I liked the way that he framed it. I think that's why people were pointing to the frame. And I think actually think Grokana coined this. So shout at Toro as well. But he called it, he said Trump cares about the Epstein class. I think that's right. Unfortunately, I think if your question is, do the American people care that Donald Trump

committed sexual assaults? I think that we can render a verdict pretty clearly that they do not. And if evidence came out that he did so to a 17-year-old or 16-year-old, did they care? Maybe. I don't know. He admitted to grabbing women by the pussy on tape. And a bunch of women gave credible allegations that he did exactly what he said on the tape.

and our fellow Americans elected him twice. So I'm like less convinced that that part is going to be politically salient. I do think that this idea that Trump went in with the promise that he was going to care about regular folks, the forgotten man, the people that got screwed over by inflation, you know, people that were, you know, that the elites didn't care about. I think that that was a powerful message. I think that the Republicans want to continue to deliver that with credibility. And I think that the Epstein thing, in combination with some of the other policies they're putting forth, give the Democrats an opportunity to kind of recapture the mantle of being like, no, actually, we're not.

It's not us. The party of the elites. Like they said that. But it turns out that like the richest cabinet in history is this guy. And that what he cared about most was his new gold ballroom and redecorating the Kennedy Center and pardoning his fancy friends. and his billion-dollar crypto grift and making sure that the people in the Epstein files didn't go to justice.

And what he didn't care all about was the fact that you were struggling to pay rent. You know? And I think that that is potentially compelling. I think it's a remains-to-be-seen thing, but I liked the way that Assoff framed it up. It's the issue that's been vexing the Democrat since 2016. And this is the side door way to get around that.

The list off everything you've just said and then add into that. the Epstein files, such as they are. It's the Epstein class. And here, look, the Dem has gotten to this tough position, which I think was a genuine pickle, which is like, Trump is promising to burn everything down. And so just like naturally, Democrats kind of this position where they were like, kind of the defenders of the status quo, like, okay, we should make some changes to the FBI.

But like, it's not a deep state conspiracy. Like, we should, you know, do that, you know, sure, we made some mistakes in foreign policy, but we shouldn't do that. And so the Democrats kept always being people that were, like, defending a democratic system that a lot of people are frustrated with, you know? And so I do think that this is now opening the door for the Democrats to capture back being like, no, that's their system that's broken. And we want to make these changes to it. And they haven't had that really since Obama was able to run against Iraq in L8, right? that was like really the last time that the Democrats got to be

you know the outside an outsider in a credible way like going after elites and Trump made that very hard it's like every college educated person is like repulsed by him so naturally the Democrats you know picked up a lot of elites on their side of the ledger during the Trump years and I think that that hurt the brand with folks so so I think the Epstein class thing might be a way to recapture some of that outsiderness. It's cathartic to be mad at the Democrats. Yeah. Here in 2026, what exactly should people be mad at the Democrats for?

Boy, I mean, the biggest thing to be mad at the Democrats for is just the lack, like, the rhetoric about the threat of Trump has not matched the actions for, for, like, for, like a decade. You know, like if Trump was an existential threat, he already did this one, but again, should we be putting up an 81 year old that can barely talk as his opponent? Probably not, you know? Like if Trump is an existential threat, should we hand the nomination to the next person in line who didn't run a particularly good campaign or should we, you know, have a contest where we, where the cream rises to the top and maybe it is, maybe it ends up in Kamala Hearst, maybe it's not. You know, if, if Trump is a biggest, you know, this grade of a threat, you know,

you know, should we spend two years, like doing nothing when it comes to investigating him and just trust that the process will work itself out? Or should we try to jumpstart it a little bit? You know, if Trump is the biggest threat, should the Democrats, you know, I'm in Louisiana. So the Democrats try to nominate people in Louisiana and Texas and some of these other states where they've run before that have maybe some, maybe some views that, like, Democratic elites don't love on various social and cultural issues. in the hopes that they can win back seats in these states, you know, rather than putting up hopeless resistance wires. Like, yeah. Should they, you know, should they be fighting about immigration?

Like, they finally are now. So I think that, like, it took the Democrats about a year to get their running shoes on, on, like, fighting the administration tooth and nail on everything, rather than, you know, whatever the first plan was, which was kind of like focus on kitchen table issues only. So I think that they're doing pretty well now. I think that I liked what we're seeing from Democrats in D.C. right now.

I think they're getting a little bit of a raw deal. I think they did pretty well in the first shutdown. I think they're doing pretty well so far on this negotiation over DHS funding. And I just wish that, like, you know, if your house was burning down and a firefighter showed up to the house, you wouldn't be like,

hey, sir, will you see if you've qualified if you can check every box of on my identity politics lists, like to make sure that we can, you know, let you, put some water on the house, you know, I don't like, want to make sure you're not problematic before you save my house from burning down. Like, no, that's not really what you would do. You know, you'd have, I think, a little bit,

a little bit looser and more forgiving. And I just, to me, that's like the fundamental issue of the Democrats. It's just that hasn't had, they, they have maybe they, what their words haven't met their actions on the Trump threat. Which Democrats,

I'm not officially running, but we all know that I'm running for president campaign has impressed you so far. I would like to be impressed more. Mm-hmm. So, um, they've left something wanting.

Yeah, well, this is not a cop out, um, because, you know, I'm going to tell people what I really think is that once the campaign actually starts,

but I just, I just, to that last question, I just, I want to see some more creative thinking. Like, I like, here's what I like about Gavin. He's tried some shit. Like at first he tried the thing and he was like, I'm going to do a podcast where I talked to Steve Bannon and Charlie Kirk

and I'm like a little nice to them. And I want to hear their views and treat them in good faith. That didn't work out so well. It was an idea. No bad ideas in a brainstorm. Then his new idea was, fuck these guys. I'm going to like go tooth and nail on them,

on social media. I'm going to be a warrior against Trump. I'm going to redistrict the state in as aggressive a way as possible to fight their, you know, gerrymandering efforts. And like, that shit worked. And so that's good. So I have, I think Gavin has some other weaknesses, but it's like, okay, great, that's good. A lot of the other people out there are kind of doing the types of stuff that you would do if this was 2012. And I just think that, I guess, to the exception of AOC. He's not like my cup of tea really ideologically. But I like that.

She's out there every night. On the steps, given viral clips, responding, being unapologetic about it, being herself. When she posts on social media, you can tell it's AOC, like maybe a staff or vets it. But you can tell she wrote it. It sounds like her. Yes. Is there another Democrat who posts where it sounds like them?

Like say you wonder about J.D. Vanson Trump, but their posts sound like them. Trump's posts are insane. J.D. Vance posts are smug and condescending. Like, I'm pretty sure both of them are doing the posts. And, you know, you would think there should be more important things for being president of the United States near 2020. But like not really, kind of. People want to feel like they know the candidate. They want authenticity.

They want to feel like the candidate is listening and cares about them. And one way to do that and signal it is to just be yourself and not be a talking point machine. So, you know, and I think the other thing is, I think that the Democrats, if you look back on the two, like, the most successful candidates of the modern media era, Barack Hussein Obama and Donald Trump. Barack Obama ran against Hillary Clinton, against the establishment of the Democratic Party, unapologetic about being the first black person running for president who didn't have that great of a resume, but he knew what he was good at. he's a great speaker. He talked about, like, in weird ways, he went to the left of the party on some stuff. He kind of cut to the center on other stuff,

talking about how we should unite between blue states and red states. Like, it was heterodox. It wasn't, like, you know, oh, I'm the liberal candidate or on the progressive candidate, or on the progressive candidate. Like, he brought something new.

Then Donald Trump brought something super new. Like, he ran to the right of the party on being a racist and on immigration and on crime. Then he ran to the left of the establishment. of the Republican Party on foreign policy and on health care and social security. That worked, obviously. And so I'm a little confused while, like, every Democrat I can think of that might run in 2028,

like their platform right now sounds like it would be not too dissimilar from the platform that Kamala Harris and Hillary Clinton ran on. Why? Why not try something really new? So I'm going to hold back my compliments until I see somebody out there that's like trying something. really new and interesting because I think that that is what the Times called for. Your point about thinking of a Democrat who sounds like themselves on social media. And I'm racking my brain. Brian Schatz from Hawaii. Can we give him a? Yeah, shout out to Brian Shots. Sounds like himself. Jasmine Crockett. Does she sound like herself on social media? I guess so. I guess so. Maybe the exception of the rules rule. There's another coldicist.

There's another cul-de-saccon. Yeah, maybe it's such the first rule. But yeah, she does. That's fair. But man, that's about all I can come up with. It's really challenging to think about somebody. Everyone else sounds like a statement. So when you say 2012 things, you mean media-wise, speaking to people like a candidate would in another era of American politics. Correct. Yeah. Yeah. It's just not modern. I don't look at, I mean, Zoron sounded like himself, right?

Mostly on the short form video. So it could be that. Like, that could be people's platform of choice. So I just think that like Any you know Sometimes you get these One thing that bugs me about now you got me on what bugs me about Democrats As like the focus group culture You get these one of these polls

One of these focus group things will come out And they'll be like we tested 30 different tweets To see which ones had the highest rating You know and the person that'll have the highest rating is like Jackie Rosen, Senator from Nevada And she wrote something that like the most people who were like playing their video games and then getting paid and like one Bitcoin to like respond yes or no to their statement

like said that they liked right and then that like and then you go to see that statement on Twitter on X and it like has 12 retweets right and it's just like there's a place for testing language I do I don't think it's unimportant to think about what people like and what's popular and to say popular things especially if you believe them is important

but it's just also important to be a human. Like people want that. They're looking for it. And I don't, you know, maybe the Democrats, because they're all like, what's, it's the, I'm doing from Chris Arneed because they're all like front of the classroom kids, front row kids. Maybe they don't know how to do this. But, but man, we need a little bit more of it, I think, on the Democratic side, if they're going to be successful.

Now, this is at the highest level. I do think that sometimes these lessons like, it kind of doesn't matter what your tweets sound like if you're running for House of Representatives, you know, depending on the districts that you're in, right? Some of these things. Like, it's just some, you know, the governor's races. I remember a focus group I sat through once where it was like from Florida and Alabama

where people liked their governor because they're actually, yeah, because they're actually accomplishing things. They wanted their governor to do, like they had real things. Like, I liked what they did at the schools or whatever. And then when it got to their member of Congress, they're like, you know, the people that really think, this is a Republican focus group, obviously, people that are really getting things done are Marjorie Taylor Green and Matt Gates. Like I'm seeing them. They're out there. They're fighting. And so I just, I do think sometimes it's different. But for a presidential, if you're a water run 2028, man, like, you shouldn't have, you shouldn't have like a 24-year-old, like, posting for you.

Or like, you shouldn't be putting out really long press release. that I don't have the attention span to read. You know, you should talk, tell people what you really think. Another question on political communication. This is fascinated me about Trump, too, is the way his administration tries to copy either his style on true social or do their own version of it. You mentioned Vance. Stephen Miller. Yeah.

Pete Hags, when he's tweeting, ICE is greater than Minnesota. Yeah, right. As a former comms guy, what do you make of the shit posting era of America? American politics. As a shit poster, I maybe am not the most credible person to say this. As a comms guy and a shit poster, what do you make? I don't love it.

I mean, I wish it was not. But like, you know, whatever. What's the line? Wishes were horses. It just is what it is now. This is the House style now. This is the House style now. Democrat or Republican.

I mean, I don't like Democrats shouldn't sound like, you know, Donald Trump. and Pete Hanksuff write at like a third grade level and they should write for their own audiences. But yeah, like a little level of shit posting is good. But also, again, being authentic to yourself is right, is what you want. That's what people want?

Like, I just, when Democrats call me, like, what do you think I should do? I'm like, this is, this is going to sound like the stupidest, like most whatever advice ever, but I'm like, what thing is Trump doing that makes you the most mad? Okay? A lot of options. Pick that thing.

and talk about it all the fucking time and be mad when you talk about it like show me that you're mad you know and that can happen in different forms you had Markelly on here he's going to be more of a gruff military guy like his madness is going to be different than me you know kind of aren't flailing arms gay

you know like we have different types of anger but like show me that you're mad and so you know I think that there will need to be a little bit of that to the Democrats I think the weakness of the Republicans copying Trump is people can see through it to a certain extent like it'll work in certain demographics, certain places.

Like, there have been some Trump copycats who win primaries in red states, you know. But I don't, in a presidential setting, when the, or in a swing state, you know, Carrie Lake tried to do a woman Trump and she famously lost twice. So there are some limits to copying the Trump style, exactly. Yeah.

When I think about the Democrats, Stephen Gavin Newsom is trying to do a version of this. Yeah, sure. kind of a half tongue and cheek comedy version, but he's trying to do shit posting. He's trying to say, I'm the benign shit poster. Yeah. So those guys, eh, not so good.

But I'm going to do the better version of this. He's trying to do show of posting. That's working for now. Like, what is the, again, what is the staying power, though, of something like, Kevin won't actually say himself, you know? And that's what I don't know, really.

Because in addition, to being able to engage in the battle of ideas on X, like also being able to communicate with people in other ways, right, is important, you know? And going on doing long-form pods, does matter now, right? Like doing short-form video, like Zoran does. It does matter now. So, you know, how can they do that?

How can these candidates figure out how to do that in a way that feels in the ballpark of natural? and sometimes I'm calling for authenticity but you're really calling for a performance this is why it's easier said than done like Zoron Zoran seems authentic to me I interviewed him and he was

pretty chill in the green room I thought like he was affable he was busy so we didn't have a ton of time to talk but it seemed pretty authentic but like you can tell he's he's got a little theater kid in him when he's doing those videos for sure you know and that

that plays right so it's A little bit easier, or it's a little bit harder than it sounds. What is the possible case for Barack Obama being on the sidelines at this point? It's hard for me to think of any. And that's just, I get my message to him. It's just like, why Trump will call you a name?

And then every once in a while, they'll put out a statement that is like, you know, that could be like the prelude to a novel, you know? And I'm like, what? What is this? A strongly worded statement. Yeah. Just call him a small dick to Vulcanarian or something. I don't care.

I don't know. Whatever. Like, do something. I don't get it. Here's the thing about, and I'd love to have the chance to talk to the president. I've been trying for a president. Why it's, I think, particularly frustrating for me is, like, he can talk to a pretty key demo that the Democrats. that's a struggle with, which is just guys.

I think Barack Obama would crush the Theo Vaughn podcast. Would crush it. And I think that Theo Vaughn would have Mon. And I think that maybe you can get through to some people that way. Or at least, you know, put some bugs in people's ears. Or at least start to change a little bit, you know, if there's a younger group of people that don't even remember Obama. Like change kind of the perception of what a Democrat sounds like.

and, you know, what a male Democratic sounds like. Another funny inside thing among a joke that you see sometimes pop up is that the Democrats could also use some straight men posting on their social media feeds. I feel like as a gay, I can say this fine. You know, I'm not trying to, I don't want to lose, you know, I don't want any to be in the game off of you to lose a job. All right, but not everybody, not every Democratic candidate politicians, voice on Twitter should be

indistinguishable from a Gaga Stan account, right? Like you gotta like, I don't know. Like that might help to reach people if you had some Democrats who just, you know, talked a little bit more comfortable bro

language. Just regular guy talk. And so Obama does. And is good at that. So I would like to see, even if you just did that. If you're like, it's just like, you're just like to do two things this year instead of doing some panel at

the University of Chicago. It's always on stage. Yeah. Get off the stage. In front of an audience. There's always like a kind of pretty good clip that comes out of it. Yeah. But he's not sitting one-on-one. He's not talking to him camera. Go hang out with Theo. Like bro out a little bit. The Theo Von Obama podcast. Oh my God.

You've just spoken this into existence. I would do huge numbers. Yes, it would do huge numbers. Yeah. What do you think J.D. Vance has presidential campaign will look like in two years? it depends on whether he stays and dad he's good graces. You know, I think that I'm of two minds of JD. I, he is the most unappealing person to me in all of public life for my entire life.

Like I find him, like Trump at least from time to time, you know, I'll get a chuckle out of Trump or whatever. I mean, I feel bad about it afterwards and I hate him, but like, J.D. Vance is singularly unappealing. as a person. And, you know, and I really, the other day, I was like really racking my brain. I said this a couple times and I was like,

is there anyone like from, you know, Saban from my childhood? I don't think about sports or. Nick Saban is on the list. Yeah, I was like, is there somebody I've hated more than this

in the movies or in pot, or in sports or in something else. And I couldn't think of anybody. And he just, like he has negative charisma for me, negative juice. So, I have to like separate that and analyze him more objectively.

And I think that sometimes I think that there are a number of people, particularly on the left or the anti-Trump side, who share that view. And so John dis is our ability to judge him as a political figure. He has been pretty damn skilled at navigating a like insane political environment on the MAGA right. Like the fact that like he has survived to this date, to this state, um, point. and both signs of the Ben Shapiro Tucker Carlson, if you'd like him.

Trump somehow, some way doesn't seem to hate his company. I don't know. Eventually, he's got to wear thin on Trump, you would think, but no evidence of that yet,

or maybe some all signs that Trump's like throwing Rubio's name in the mix of them. But, um, uh, so he's managed that. Uh, you know, he ran a,

won a primary, like won the inside game. in a red state in Ohio as a former never-trumper, one inside gang to VP, like that's all, not nothing. I mean, uh,

far, you know, people that had, that were more appealing than J.D. Vance have failed to survive in this Republican party and this, uh, you know, with all the sharks swimming around.

So, I don't underestimate his ability to kind of triangulate. I also, I don't know if this is allowed on podcast. This is like this. You can, your lawyers can check me. I do think he's a sociopath, which has some benefits in politics.

I do think he would just, if he felt like switching on a dime on something would help him, he would. And he's changed his name three times. It's kind of weird. Changes religion. And a lot of people have changed their name or changed their religion. They're like, it's pretty strange, though, to change your name multiple times, change your religion, change your entire political identity. And in order to get power. And he's done all that.

I just go back to his debate with Tim Walls, which he won. Which he won, and partly, I think, his ability to be a shape shifter. I'm going to come in and be a conciliatory guy. Can't we all just have a nice, common sense exchange of ideas here? And then on Twitter, he can play something completely different. Yeah, he's good at that. And he's good at, again, it doesn't work for me because repulsed. But once I separate myself out from that, when he does this thing,

like, have you seen the racist thing he did about the neighbors? Or he's just like, here's the thing, guys. Like, I'm not against immigration. You know, I think I want people to be able to come here if they do it the right way. But if you're living in a house in a community and rents are going up, the mortgage is going up, and one of your friends wants to move into your neighborhood, but they can't afford it. And then somebody else moves in. And it's people from another country and they don't speak the same language as you.

And then you find out that there are three families living in one house. And it's getting a little rowdy over there. It's not irrational to think. maybe that's not what's best for my neighborhood. Like he gave that, like, that's how he kind of talks about this, which I hope everybody can see through, but I'm not sure. I think he has like a little bit of a skill at taking, like Trump's skill is taking like a really noxious position

and like almost like joking about it and winking at those voters and being like, maybe I'll do it, maybe I won't, you know? And so, you know, you can't pin me down. And so the people that want them to do the racist thing are like, hell yeah, he's going to do it. And the people that don't are like, oh, that's just Trumpian cheeky. Like, that's how Trump manages this. JD's trying a different approach.

Maybe his approach won't work. But it's, it might. That might be his superpower, though. Yeah. His ability to. Yeah, just kind of like. maneuver in that world. Try to make something that seems that's pretty extreme, seem not so extreme.

And pretend like you like somebody. Be affable. Like J.D. Vance kind of pretended like him. Well, yeah, I don't know. Walls got ran in circle around him. You had a great interview with Marty Barron on your podcast last week. Yeah. Thank you.

Why does Jeff Bezos still want to own the Washington Post? He and Marty went back and forth this a little bit. And so I take Marty's analysis because he worked closely with Jeff Bezos. He saw this transition. He did say on the podcast, I asked him if he'd spoken to Jeff in the last year. And I think he said some of the effect of I sent him a one. an email about a year ago and the response wasn't great or something to that. A fact, I don't have the

quote in front of me, but, um, so, you know, maybe, so he doesn't have up to date insight on what's in Jeff's brain. But he gave like a pretty, just straight, like this guy is a capitalist. He wants to conquer the world. And there was a period of time where he felt like he could do that and also, you know, and also advance democratic principles.

And, uh, and now that calculation is different. And so he's acting accordingly. And he doesn't want to give up the paper, but he still wants to be able to make a lot of money and do Blue Origin and do all this other stuff. That didn't really sit right with me, that explanation. Like to me, and what I went back to him on was,

I think it's more about, like, it's less about the money and more about the ego. Like, he doesn't, he wants to, like, he still wants to be the guy. I own this, I own that, I own the other thing. and, you know, better, you know, it's a dick measuring contest with, like, Elon and the other billionaires, right? Like, I just think that there's a little bit, that is what's going on. And this is, you know, a little bit non-PC to say, but, you know, we're here at the ringer.

And the wife, the wife swap is also something to consider. I do think that there is some. The ownership of the Washington Post. Well, yeah. I just think that the, well, I think that the previous life was very excited about the democracy, he dies a darkness mission. And I'm not sure that's the case in the new marriage. So I just think that like caring about the post from like a, you know,

might impact whether he cares about it or he has some kind of emotional connection. So I think that it's one of the things where you can keep it. He's still, he's a mogul. He owns it. He also owns the rockets, ships. Not the Houston rockets, just to be clear. And Amazon. So that's, I guess that's my sense.

you know, you don't, why take an L and sell it to somebody? And I saw the crazy story. I wish I, I think it came out after I interviewed Marty. Was it like a group? Oliver Darcy wrote this over in status. A group came to him, Bezos, and said, basically, we want to partner with you. We'll pay and we'll run.

I believe it was local, sports, and maybe one of the thing. I think it was three elements. Spin it off, essentially. Yeah, or, and, like, I think they gave my understanding based on this report is it like maybe there are ways to do it. Like it could be a total spinoff where we, it's our own thing. It could be a thing where it's like, you know, whatever, insert name here, presented by the Washington Post and Amazon, you know, whatever.

License it to us. Yeah, license it. Yeah, some other thing. And they said no. And to me, that just says, okay, well, this isn't a business decision. Like, there's no way to look at what he did as a business decision. Like, if the right, if the right choice was trying to maximize profits out of Washington Post, you know, you are leaning in on.

politics. That's what works the last time. You know, you're leaning in on insidery DC stuff. You're keeping high school sports and charging the parents who want to see their kids lacrosse stats, you know, absorbent amounts of money.

Like, they didn't do any of that. Like, they got rid of stuff that you think that they can make money on. And they're keeping, and that, you know, and they're like, well, we're going to try to appeal to a broader audience of more conservatives, I guess. It's just like, that's not going to work. There's no evidence that that's going to work.

And I don't even think that they care. I guess that's my point. I don't think that he cares about the business of it. As a comms guy, I was thinking about you with this because all of us journalists have been like, you know, hashtag support journalism. Save the posts. These hashtags have not worked to the degree we want them to work. No. How would you advise a reporter to convince a person to subscribe to a newspaper?

Like, what's the affirmative case for that? I don't think the high-minded Woodward and Bernstein thing is the answer. I'll start there. Some people will support media for that reason. I think we're supported with the Bullock by a lot of people who don't really care about our secret podcast offerings, but they just want to support us because they've built a relationship with us and like what we're doing. And it's kind of like, you know, we're going to support our guys here. I appreciate it.

You guys are bringing me joy in the podcast in our ears. and so we'll just, you know, throw you the $10 a month. That's not really a model for reporting, right? Like, and we're building out, we do some reporting at the work, but it's hard to do that at scale, you know? But I think that there's something to learn from that, right? Like, just actually building a relationship with the audience

and providing value to them is a good first step. But look, how did, how did newspapers make money in the past? Right? It's like classified sports, stuff like that. I just would go back to that. I don't know. Like, I think about my, I think I made the shirt, yeah, my boys at DNVR.

Okay. Okay. Okay. They started in Denver, kind of like a, almost kind of a simmonsie inspired, kind of like a fan perspective, but also reporting on Denver sports outlet. And huge success. They've expanded to a couple of cities now. And I was thinking, I went to a friend who runs like nonprofit newsrooms. I actually have pitched just a couple of friends. So if you have any nonprofit newsrooms, you're watching. And also. like you guys should do this backward like you guys should do this like create a you know like I'm a die hard or whatever for DNVR which I just you know it's kind of like again what do I get what I get a couple bucks off the t-shirt or something but like create that something that it's community oriented that people care about all right and now now let's back in some investigative journalism onto it right like let's let's go the old model did work like there's maybe something there still, right, where we can like make, get people excited about this brand.

They're in for, because they want to know about what the local new restaurants that are opening are, whatever, and the local sports teams. And then you're also giving them some investigative journalism. And I don't, I don't think that's a crazy model. I just, I think that, like, too many journalists do the, you need to sports, because this is crucial work for it. It's like a finger waggy thing. And does that, do people respond to that? I don't think so. Well, I think some people do, but I think we already have their credit card numbers.

Yeah, right. They're in. Yeah. And then now it's this big group that says, you know, and not only are they, you know, maybe turned off or just not that that message doesn't hit them. They're also like, man, I got my Tim Miller podcast. I got my Pod Save guys. I got Van Lathen. One of these free things in my life.

Yeah. And I hear all this stuff about the news and it sounds like political news. and they cite sources, you know, stories from those places. But, like, why am I paying for this other thing? Right. Why is that important to me? And that's a Rubicon that needs to be crossed. And it's hard, right?

It's crowded. It is crowded. I mean, The Times has figured it out. Wall Street Journal is figured it out. Wall Street Journal provides people financial news, which is why they do it, insider stuff. Information's figured it out in San Francisco. They provide insiders, insidery stuff.

Like, is there not a way to do that local? I like Mississippi, what is it, Mississippi today? Mississippi today. They're doing it. I mean, I want, I don't know. Again, I'm just trying to think about like, what are the stuff, like, I'm a goody two shoes now and I'm in the media. So whatever. I subscribe to the, I don't know, we don't even know what it's called anymore.

Maybe nola.com, maybe the Times Picune, maybe the advocate. There's several iterations. I subscribe. Like, why? Like, what am I getting from it? It's like, I want to know the new restaurant. I'm paying for Ian McBeltie. I want to know the new.

restaurant that is opening in town. Like, I want to know what happened in the, you know, discussion about how to, about like charter school, um, availability, right? Like getting in the lottery. You know, like news you can use is what we used to call it. Right. And so I think that maybe just focusing on that is the way to go, um, to try to get some revitalization.

It's tough though, man. But I don't see what the answer is besides, like, providing people a service they really want or building a relationship with the community that is authentic. And, you know, I'm getting some, finding some billionaires who want to do the nice thing. Like, unfortunately, that's kind of the situation where I'm, I got a few more quick ones for you. Fire away. You interviewed Olivia Nutsi on your podcast. How do you look back at that interview?

probably got had the most feedback from any of interview I've ever done. Everyone had a thought about my interviewing chops, which is nice. I did not grow up as an interviewer, so I'm learning as I go on the podcast. It's hard. You know, you see this. I was like, I'm trying to get better. And so I take feedback. It was hard to kind of sift through the feedback of Olivia because, you know, half the people are like,

you were too mean to her. Ask people like, you were too nice to her. I was like, okay. Had specific things they wish I'd ask. Look, I don't think that Olivia was ready to do media. This is just what I really think.

And I think that I have some empathy for her. I know Olivia, I should just say, in candor, personally. And I have gone through, I've been in the ringer tomorrow term. I've been in the barrel. of media firestorms, nothing like what she has,

but I've been there, and it sucks, and I know what it's like. And so I've, like, I have a little bit of empathy for her. And I thought that people were a little mean about the book. I thought there was like some really, like if you were like,

Tim, you have to bring one political book or one book for like the last three years to an island with yourself. Like, would you bring American Conto or would you bring like one of the million TikTok behind the scenes of what happened on the campaign books? Like, I'd bring American Canto.

at least it has some, some, you know, jean-se-cois. You know, there are some well-turned phrases. There was some other, you know, other stuff that could maybe, you know, could have got at a few more rounds of edits. But, you know, whatever. I could say that about my book. I look back on some things in my book and cringe. So I just, to me, it was like, she wrote this.

You went through this thing where she made some ethical breaches where she admitted. And she's going to go out and talk about it. If you go out and talk about it, you got to be ready to talk about it. You got to be ready to talk about it. going to be ready to talk about the things you fucked up and the things you think are unfair about the criticisms and whatever. And that's what people want to know. And she just kind of wasn't ready to go there.

Or maybe she never will be. I don't know. And so I think that was kind of the... I think that rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. What do you miss about working in politics? I was about to say not shit. But that's not exactly right. I'm much happier in my new job. I don't know. PR wasn't great.

I feel like PR was bad for my soul because I'm very competitive and I found myself, you know, spinning a little too hard. And I have some regrets about that. So I, what I do miss is, like, as a kid growing up, I was never good at sports, but I like sports. You know? And there's a little bit of time where I got my fix from campaigns. and like part of it was in the stat side, which I can still do in this job. But part of it was like, you know, if you, your candidate just like really nailed a debate

or just like gave a good speech where the crowd is on fire, you know? Or you're at the convention and they, you know, one of the rare good speeches. And, you know, people, the crowd is into it. And you're like been one of the advisors that wrote the speech. So that was, you know, one of the things I did. You walk out of there like with a big skip in your stuff. step. Like, it's a big rush, you know? Like, it feels good. And, you know, none of us are ever going to be rock stars, right? So it's like the, like, the tiniest little taste of that to, like, to walk up stage,

and like, hell yeah, you know, like the music, like, we nailed that one. And I miss that. And I miss a little bit, like, the road and people. You know, I got to do that with the circus RIP before that was canceled. And I like, you know, my job is great. I love being in New Orleans. I love that my kids room is down the hall from my podcast room. But I like people. I miss a little bit kind of being out amongst the folks. And getting a huge podcast guest that just destroys in metrics. That's not the same feeling as can it walking off the stage. It's not the same feeling. No, you can't get that high on the podcast guest. I've had a couple good, I feel good at the end of a good palatite. You know this. If you like feel like you really hold something out of them and

the audience is going to like it, it feels it's fulfilling in a way. you know, like especially, I had Tana Hasi Coats on the other week, and we disagree on some stuff, particularly, you know, around, you know, peak woke, if you will. But man, it was just, he does a good pod. You know, you got to shout out the guy. Like, he does good pod. Like, it was, there's a good back and forth. You know, we were vibing. I felt like he made some points that I, that made me think. I don't know if I made him think, but I made him laugh, you know, and, and we're able to get into some, some touchy subjects. but in a way that I thought the audience would appreciate. Like, that's cool. Like, that's fulfilling in a way that, like, giving a good speech is not, you know, because that's propaganda.

And this is, like, higher learning. Shut up, Van. Right? And so that's cool, but it's still not the same. It's not the same rush. I believe we're contractually obligated to call these sliding doors moments at the ringer. So of the Republican candidates

whose campaigns you worked on or worked adjacent to, who would have been the best? best president, John McCain, Mitt Romney, or Jeb Bush? I think that the answer to that is probably Mitt. And I was the least close to him of the three. I love Jeb the best. He was a great governor, really great governor.

And he probably would have been a great president in 1988. You could have replaced HW as a great president. you could probably replace them and get pretty similar results. But, you know, he just, like, the modern media environment is just different. And Mitt, like, Mitt was a terrible candidate in 2008. I cannot overstate this. Terrible. Awkward, weird.

And he got better. You rarely see this in policy. Asoff has gotten a lot better. Actually, you mentioned him earlier. You rarely see this. People who, like, he got a lot better. In 2012, he was a really good candidate. And, you know, I mean,

he beat Obama in the first debate. Did. And Obama would would admit that. And I think that he could have used the bully pulpit. He had a, he has a moral core, but he also is adaptable. And maybe too much in some ways,

flip-flopping that, but I don't know. I think that he would have, I think that he would have been a really good president. Last one. You said you want to interview Obama. Would interviewing Donald Trump be interesting to you? Not really,

because Trump's full of shit. I mean, I, I encounter, me and him have, had a couple of encounters on spin rooms and such. I've been able to ask him questions, but it's like, it's so hard. Didn't you follow him to a spin room one time? I followed him around a couple spin rooms, and then he saw me in one. And so we've had a few, like, brief interactions. He just, I guess, sure, I would do it.

But, like, he's just so full of shit. And that it's hard to, like, get anything meaningful out of them. And even if you do, it's kind of like, well, you can change his mind at two seconds, right? It's just not, I don't know. I don't feel like I would really enjoy it. But I would enjoy interviewing J.D. Vance, but I would enjoy interviewing J.D. Van So that's number one on the last. Yeah.

I would rather do J.D. Vance for sure. Yeah. Because he thinks he's really smart. And so in some ways it would be kind of a skills challenge. I feel like I would really be testing my skills. And I kind of, I was a little mean to Tim Walls when I interviewed him the other week because I was like, you failed. And I feel like I'm kind of, there's a put up or shut up element to this. You know, it's like, all right, whipp or snapper, how could you do?

And I feel like I do pretty well with JD. But I'm not, I'm not counting my chickens. But you're open to invite, Mr. Vice President. Tim Miller, he gives good pod. I'm trying. Thank you so much for doing this. Thanks for coming on the press box. Happy to do it, brother.

Good to see you.